


Pinpoint

by Nabielka



Category: Sibirskiy tsiryulnik | The Barber of Siberia (1998)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-26
Packaged: 2019-06-16 20:49:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15445560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nabielka/pseuds/Nabielka
Summary: After the duel, Polievsky pays Tolstoi a visit.





	Pinpoint

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alley_Skywalker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alley_Skywalker/gifts).



Andrei was asleep. 

It both did and did not come as a relief. Polievsky had thought of what he might say, or rather, had tried to. He thought not of the wound or of Tolstoi lying in bed, which did not seem real, but of how he did not even know the moment he had hurt Tolstoi. There had been only a little light. Their rapiers had flashed; here and there Polievsky had had glimpses of Tolstoi’s face, the curve of a cheek, his furrowed forehead. Nor could he know the moment in which Tolstoi had decided he could not bear such things said of Jane, only that he had taken hurt. 

How far from Saint Helena had Polievsky been, leaning in to ask why he should not talk so? How far had he been, the pointer snapping through the air? Tolstoi’s face, turned to him, had been the face of a stranger; worse, the face of a man who had just found himself alone among strangers. 

In sleep, at least Polievsky could still recognise him. Wounded, he slept no different from any other time, drunk, slipping into sleep mere hours before they were to rise again. It was the face Polievsky knew; he, who, waking early, could turn to watch the rise of his chest, the strange stillness of his face. Awake, Andrei’s face was rarely still, his mouth turned up a little at the corner, his eyes bright. It hurt to look at him. 

At least when he slept, Polievsky had no occasion to compare the smiles he bestowed, to think of how of late his eyes had carried only rebuke, and the warmth had been directed only towards Jane Callahan. 

For all that, Polievsky found himself discontented. He had been distracted enough to flounder in his lessons, to linger in the corridors and run through his lines, not for Mozart but for Tolstoi, and yet here Tolstoi slept, as peacefully as though nobody in this damn school had ever wounded him, as though nobody had ever had cause to fear for him. He was affronted, though he knew well enough the sentiment would not long outlast Tolstoi’s waking. 

Still he turned from him, though there was little other place to put his eyes. During the day, they were hardly ever alone, and then the fear of discovery provided sufficient incentive not to allow his eyes to linger on Andrei. He had a way of drawing the eye even in a crowd, though many were better born or had features commonly considered more pleasing. It lifted his heart to catch Tolstoi’s eye whenever one of the others was making a fool of himself; he himself was fool enough that catching sight of Tolstoi at all brightened his mood. 

There was a glass by the little table by his bed. It had been half emptied. As he picked it up, he caught himself as thoughtlessly, he made to cast Tolstoi a furtive glance, leaving him with a twitch that Tolstoi, awake, would surely have mocked. There was no reason to suppose that he should have woken in that moment, and no reason to think it odd. Even now the others were eating. He had wanted a moment alone with Tolstoi, and not only, as the others supposed, to assuage his guilt. He had a right to be thirsty. 

Twisting his wrist, he considered where Tolstoi might have placed his mouth. He had not left a mark, but still Polievsky felt an illicit thrill in bringing the glass to his lips, in the taste of the water. 

He left some for Andrei: four gulps, maybe five. Then turning, he froze, for he saw that Andrei’s eyes, so dark in so pale a face, were open and fixed on him, and felt too the awareness shoot through him. He felt at once flushed and chilled; the glass was still in his hand, hovering just over where he ought to have laid it down. 

He felt, all of a sudden, the perverseness of what he was doing, standing over Tolstoi’s bed, appropriating his glass. He heard again the clash of the blades, the litany of it barely broken. Had it not been for him, Andrei would be trying to charm a larger helping of whatever the others were having for supper, not lying there, possessing barely colour than the sheets. 

He took a breath, but the air was so still and Polievsky was so aware of it that he could not drag up the words he had constructed on the way there. He was as little able to talk as he had been to make himself stop, as though again that mad haze had settled upon him where he saw the twist of Tolstoi’s face and yet could not fall silent or walk back his words. He had a habit of picking at his scratches until the scars bled again; he had not learned yet how to stop doing it to others. 

All he could think to say, was _You’re awake,_ but that he could not say. How many times had he turned to Tolstoi with a half-smile as one of the others – Alibekov, perhaps – was directing inane comments at some unfortunate young lady? He had too much pride to take up the role himself. Even if Tolstoi had, turning that stupid besotted grin towards Jane.

It had never been like that between them. He did not talk to Andrei of how much he liked his eyes or how well his uniform suited him; Andrei did not say – well, whatever Andrei might have thought. It had galled him to look at how Tolstoi conducted himself around Jane, and to compare it with what attention he himself received, even at the height of Andrei’s interest. 

He told him instead, likewise blandly, that it had been covered up and how, though likely Tolstoi would have been told this already, would have remembered the words hissed in the morning or would have been told so by the others earlier. If he’d been awake, and not delirious from the wound Polievsky had dealt him. 

But Tolstoi only took it with a slight nod. To look at him now chilled Polievsky. Even when they had fought before, even when Tolstoi had rebuked him, had challenged him, he had not seen that distance in his face. 

“Andrei,” he said finally, “I didn’t mean to cause you harm.” 

The words, even to him, felt inadequate. It was easier to make the rounds on the Sunday of Forgiveness, where ritual calmed the soul; easier, certainly, than to dredge up the words now. In truth, Polievsky only half regretted it. He had not meant Tolstoi harm, had even tried to refuse the duel, and he had been panicked enough to strike blood. But he had self-awareness enough to know that he wanted Tolstoi’s attention on him, even in anger, more than he wanted many other things in life, save perhaps to avoid degradation. He would have rather have Andrei’s smile, the warmth of his touch, but anything was better than to have Andrei look straight past him at Jane Callahan. 

“I know,” said Tolstoi. His face could not exactly be called warm, but it lacked the blankness of before, lacked also the fixedness of the last two days. “You tried to refuse the duel. I don’t bear grudges.”

That was true. Tolstoi had a temper, but was not resentful. Polievsky let himself seethe and pushed it down, and then he ended up doing stupid things. 

“Still, you could have been hurt much worse." It came out too sincere, too revealing of how badly Polievsky could have coped with it. He felt himself flush and made to cover it. "I would have to run from your mother all the way to Yekaterinburg. What would I do there? My father will disown me if the Academy expels me.”

It did not earn the full laugh he most liked from Tolstoi, nor the soft look he cherished the most, but on that day even the huff of amusement at such pouting complaints lifted Polievsky’s spirits more than it would have cheered him to be noticed by the Tsar. He returned Andrei’s smile with a fervour stronger than was proper, and was content.


End file.
